Introduction

 
 9% of survey complete.
Thank you for taking 15 minutes of your time to answer this important survey conducted within the framework of the Digital Transport and Logistics Forum (DTLF).

The DTLF is an expert group composed of transport and logistics business and industry representatives, representatives of Member States authorities and other transport and logistics experts. It assists the European Commission in developing and implementing policy measures with a view to improve the efficiency of European transport and logistics.

Objective
The key objective of this survey is to understand the current state of play regarding the use of electronic documents in transport. The survey targets primarily the (potential) users of such documents.

The survey covers all documents that contain information related to the cargo which need to be transferred between the actors along the transport and logistics chain and/or shown to the public authorities for inspection in order for a transport operation to be completed.

The survey refers to two types of freight transport documents:
  • Documents which are used as evidence of contractual relationship between shipper and carrier and which are covered by respective international conventions (for e.g. CMR, CIM/SMGS consignment notes, air waybill, bill of loading etc.)
  • Documents accompanying the goods as evidence of ownership, certificates of origin, phytosanitary certificates, dangerous goods certificates and the like.

Acronyms and definitions
Throughout the survey, the acronym "e-fTD" is used to refer to freight transport documents in electronic format.
By "e-fTD solutions" it is understood the IT-based applications that allow the use of the information /data otherwise contained in paper transport documents in an electronic format (e.g. eCMR and Transfollow for road, eAWB360 for air, electronic CIM/SMGS for rail, etc.).
By "international/cross-border" transport it is primarily understood a transport operation that crosses at least one border between the EU Member States.

Confidentiality
The identity of the respondents will not be disclosed. However, identification information as regards the type of organisation, size and Member State of origin will be used for the purposes of the analysis. 

Disclaimer
This survey does not represent an official inquiry. Expected responses will therefore not be treated as official, permanent or binding in any way and are fully confidential. They will form the basis for work that will continue to evolve during the entire DTLF lifespan.

Respondents are invited to answer on a "best-effort" basis. The majority of questions are not mandatory and respondents may skip those questions that are not applicable to them.

Timeline
This survey is open until 30 September 2017.
In order to provide a first feed-back on the findings of the survey to the DTLF plenary meeting scheduled for 26 April 2017, an intermediate cut-off date is set for 21 April.

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